


Hallelujah

by spookythings



Category: Rule of Rose (Video Game)
Genre: F/F, forever land, red bird of happiness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-02
Updated: 2020-09-02
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:26:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26253361
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spookythings/pseuds/spookythings
Summary: Eleanor falls ill, and Clara tends to her.
Relationships: Clara/Eleanor
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	Hallelujah

**Author's Note:**

> This story is part of a 14-part album fic challenge, in which each song from a single album will serve as inspiration for the story. The album I chose is “And No More Shall We Part” by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds.

It started with a sniffle --

No, that's not right.

It started with a tickle in her throat --

No... no, not quite.

It started with a girl --

And a bird --

And a lie --

And a pillowcase faded and frayed with age --

And streaked with blood.

* * *

"It's nothing," she lied, voice thick with mucus.

Clara looked doubtful, but didn't press the issue.

* * *

"I'm fine," she lied, ignoring the low rumble in the hollow of her stomach. She hadn't eaten in a little over a day, but she could hardly be blamed for that -- the slop Miss Martha prepared in the kitchen was unappetizing under the best of circumstances, which admittedly, these were not.

But a sore throat was hardly the end of the world.

Clara left her alone.

* * *

"It's..."

"A fever," Clara said, bluntly, her hand falling away from Eleanor's forehead. It returned a moment later with a scratchy bit of fabric to dab at the blood crusted beneath Eleanor's nose.

"Come on, then," she said, gently.

She was small for her age, Miss Clara. Four years older than Eleanor, but only five centimeters taller.

 _Petite,_ Mr. Hoffman called her, his mouth smiling, his eyes travelling.

 _Frail,_ Miss Martha insisted. There was something reproachful -- accusatory -- in her tone, as if though Clara had quite deliberately chosen her waifish constitution in order to be personally offensive to the cleaning witch, and Clara would bow her head apologetically.

 _Pathetic,_ Diana said, and Meg agreed, and Amanda giggled and panted after them, eager to prove to them that she -- sturdy girl, good and solid -- was just the opposite. That she was just like them.

 _Soft,_ Eleanor thought, as Clara pulled Eleanor closer, looping one of Eleanor's arms across her own thin shoulders, and her arm around Eleanor's waist. Under any other circumstances, Eleanor would have balked at another human being touching her, but at the moment, and it being Clara... she let herself be held.

Together, they trudged from the dormitory, down the hall, past Wendy's room and into the Sick Bay, where a cot had been made up in preparation.

"Arms up," Clara instructed, already reaching for the hem of Eleanor's dress. Orange and brown with cute sailor accents, it was Eleanor's favorite. She raised her arms obediently, although the motion made her sway and her vision swim.

Then the dress was gone, and Eleanor stood there in her thin white slip, shivering not from the cool, drafty air softly brushing against her hot skin, but from Clara's fingertips straightening the slip at her knees, the straps at her shoulders, and brushing her hair from her face.

"That should help," Clara said, surveying her efforts. Eleanor looked both pale and weak. A far cry from the blank little stoic she was known to be amongst the other children. Clara made a mental note to fetch a bucket in case the girl needed to vomit. "Let's get you up on the cot so you can rest, now."

Again, Eleanor did not resist her.

"There," she said, pulling the blanket up to Eleanor's chest. Eleanor looked at her through heavy lids, ringed with dark lashes and circles. "Get some rest, Eleanor. You'll be good as new in no time."

Clara tried not to be alarmed by the congested heave of Eleanor's breathing as she gathered the girl's dress -- filthy and damp, reeking of sweat and sickness -- to take it to the filth room.

Certainly, she would be fine.

Even sickly, broken Wendy was doing better nowadays, and Eleanor was much stronger than her.

Still, she worried.

* * *

_The string tugged in her hand, pulled taut by the red bird at the other end._

_She smiled as she looked up at it, straining against the tether, flapping its wings in frantic futility._

_She held tight to her end._

_It wouldn't get away this time._

_This time, it would take her to Forever Land._

* * *

"She's faking it," Diana told Meg as they huddled together in a bathroom stall.

"Of course," Meg agreed. Of course. "She'd do anything for attention."

"Even so, she'll never be _his_ favorite," Diana sneered.

She'd gladly break every bone in Eleanor's body if she thought the headmaster's affections could be transferred through sheer misery alone.

"Surely not," Meg said with a harsh bark of laughter. "A disgusting wretch like her would never be able to compete with a Duchess."

Diana smiled down at Meg, her mind coiled and ready to strike.

* * *

_"Are we almost there?" she called up to the bird._

_"Soon," it chirped back._

_It was no longer straining at the lead._

* * *

"How is she?"

His hand on her shoulder did not comfort or reassure her, no matter how tender his touch.

"Tired," she replied, and tried to focus on her needlework. Amanda had taken over the sewing room, made the space oppressive and unwelcome, so now Clara did her sewing by hand in the sick room. "Mostly she just sleeps."

His thumb was working -- rubbing and rubbing and rubbing -- in circular motions.

Her shoulder now, but it would move lower.

Rubbing and rubbing and rubbing.

She could stab him -- it was a fresh needle. Sharp.

Make him pull his hand away.

Make him send her away.

Make this whole charade go away.

She pulled the needle through the fabric and held it tightly between her fingers.

Oh, but where else was there for her to go?

The world was vast, and unknown, and she was so small --

Petite --

Frail --

Pathetic.

She turned the needle over in her fingers, plunged it deep into her own flesh, and they both jumped.

"Poor girl," he said, sympathetically. "Let me help you with that."

She left the needle in the folds of the fabric, gathered neatly into a bundle on the chair.

He led her first to the cabinet where they kept the bandaids and the ointment, and then back to his room, where he kept --

Rubbing and rubbing and rubbing.

* * *

_The gates to Forever Land swung open as they approached._

_She could see it on the other side._

_All flowers and fairy lights._

_Castles drifted past._

_She could smell her father's cologne._

_Was he here?_

_Waiting?_

_Had he come here to find her in Forever Land?_

* * *

Days slipped by unnoticed.

Clara spent most of them sitting beside the cot in the sick bay, sewing and reading and watching the girl grow pallid and gray in her fitful slumber.

When she ran out of things to mend and books to interest her, she scrubbed the floors and neatened the cabinets and wiped down the sink.

Eleanor slept, without waking, without eating or drinking, which was troubling; but she was there, and that was a comfort, as well.

When she ran out floors to scrub, and cabinets to tidy, and sinks to wipe, she pulled her chair closer to Eleanor, who didn't move at all, and she began to talk.

She told her of her memories before the orphanage, which were few and obscured by shadows; she told her about the other children, and what trouble they'd caused that day; she told her about how the weather was changing, and how the skies were dark now, not only at night but always; she told her of her fears, which were vivid and immeasurable.

And when she ran out of banal patter, she told Eleanor about Mr. Hoffman, and how lucky she was to have dark hair and boyish features; she'd been disqualified from Hoffman's favoritism by sheer genetic good fortune.

And when this confessional took its toll, she folded her arms upon the mattress beside the girl, laid her head down and wept.

* * *

_"There," said Papa, holding her in his knee. He pointed one long, elegant finger._

_Eleanor followed it with her eyes._

_"The orphanage?" She asked, curious. "What about it, Papa?"_

_"Look closer, Ellie," he said, and Eleanor found herself squinting down at the familiar building._

_"What about it?" She asked, again._

_"Do you see her?"_

_Her?_

_She saw Diana and Meg, practicing their courtesies in the attic._

_"No, not like that," Diana snapped at Meg. "Oh, you're hopeless. Here, let me show you."_

_Diana crossed her ankles, bent her knees slightly, gathered the folded pleats of her dress in each fist, and slowly, deliberately, lifted her skirt, higher and higher, until --_

_Eleanor looked away._

_She saw Amanda, lurking just outside of the attic, watching the Duchess and the Baroness, her face contorting as emotions conflicted and collided; anger and longing churning into a poisonous sludge that roiled within her._

_She saw Jennifer, kneeling beside a wash basin in the filth room._

_She saw Wendy in the sick bay, out of bed for once._

_She watched as Wendy knelt beside Peter's cage with a fork, and after a long moment of contemplation, she jabbed at him, not quite understanding the excitement that built within her as the helpless creature cowered and cried, unable to escape her attention._

_Eleanor, who had no fondness for animals, felt bad for Peter; it was hardly fair at all that Wendy should corner him like that._

_She saw herself, lying on the cot in the sick room._

_And she saw Clara, sitting next to her, with her head buried in her arms on the bed beside her._

_"Why is Clara crying, Papa?"_

_Papa looked thoughtfully down at the child weeping beside the fragile form of his daughter. "Why did you cry when I went away?"_

_"Silly Papa! I cried because you are my papa!"_

_Papa laughed and kissed her gently on the crown of her head._

_"Indeed, I am!" He said, smiling proudly. "But you cried, my darling, because when I went away to Forever Land, you lost the one person who cared about you. You cried because you were left alone in a world much too big for such a little you."_

_"Poor Clara," Eleanor said, looking back down at her friend. The only one she'd ever truly had._

_"Yes," said Papa. "Poor Clara."_

_"Maybe she can come to Forever Land with me," Eleanor said, immediately becoming attached to the idea of it. In Forever Land, Papa could take care of them both. They would be sisters._

_Not like Sally and Mary, but real sisters, who never hurt each other._

_"Perhaps someday," Papa said. "But not now."_

_"Why not?"_

_"She is not yet ready to come to Forever Land," Papa explained, gently. "She has so much more to do before she comes to Forever Land."_

_Eleanor, who had spent her entire life dreaming of Forever Land, did not understand why Clara would choose life at the orphanage over eternity in Forever Land._

_"Will she be alright?" Eleanor asked Papa, who shrugged helplessly._

_"It will be hard for her," he said. "She has lost something dear to her that will not be easily replaced."_

_"Me?"_

_"You."_

_Eleanor sat there on Papa's knee, and watched as Clara wept while she lay still and fragile and dying on the cot beside her._

_On a table not too far away from them, the red bird began to trill and flutter restlessly in its golden cage, the string still dangling from its leg._

_An open invitation._

* * *

After Clara had expelled all of her secrets, all of the sadness and the filth, and after she had cried for what had seemed like days, she felt not empty and refreshed, as she should have, but heavy and exhausted.

Sick, but not in a useful way, like Eleanor.

Only miserable and lost.

Eleanor had been the closest thing she'd had to a family -- was likely the closest thing she ever would have.

What was she to do now?

The realization brought with it a fresh wave of tears.

And a hand --

Small and warm and uncertain --

Softly caressed her hair.

Clara raised her head, startled.

"Eleanor?"

"Don't cry, Clara," Eleanor whispered, the best she could do after so many, many days of silence. "It will be alright. Next time I go to Forever Land, you can go with me."

* * *

  
_Now, you might think it wise to risk it all  
Throw caution to the reckless wind  
But with her hot cocoa, and her medication  
My nurse has been my one salvation  
So I turned back home  
I turned back home  
I turned back home  
Singing my song..._

_Hallelujah, hallelujah  
Hallelujah, hallelujah  
Hallelujah, hallelujah  
Hallelujah, hallelujah  
Hallelujah_


End file.
